This past weekend I got to go to Lisbon, Portugal with my group! I've always heard so many good things about the city, and I was so anxious all week to leave. Friday morning Megan and I had to wake up at 6am in order to make it to the bus by 8. Not exactly a desirable hour—but we got to sleep a lot on the bus. It was about a 6 hour bus ride but not too painful (I slept most of the way). It was great to finally get to the hotel and get situated.

After a quick lunch, we went on a walking tour of the city. We meandered our way up many of Lisbon's hills and made it to the Castle of São Jorge. Although it was quite a journey up all the hills, it was totally worth it! At the top of the castle there was the most amazing view of all of Lisbon! After the castle tour was over, we had the rest of the night free. This is when my Portuguese skills quickly became of use! I was pretty rusty at first because it's just been Spanish Spanish Spanish since I got here (obviously). I was able to get directions to the Plaza Rossio (the main plaza in Lisbon) and my friends and I spent a few hours scoping out some shops. Luckily, dinner time in Portugal is a little earlier than in Spain so we began our search for some good Portuguese food. We turned down the main restaurant street and were quickly bombarded with waiters from different restaurants shoving menus in our faces in the middle of the street! Apparently it's normal in Lisbon—but we just found it obnoxious!!! We finally agreed to go into a place where the prices looked reasonable and the food looked tasty. We all ordered the same thing; a very typical Portuguese dish that consists of (essentially) scrambled eggs, French fries, olives, onions, and bacalão. Bacalão is salted codfish that Portugal is infamous for—and rightfully so! It's delicious!! Although our dinner might sound kind of disgusting, it was really good!

The next morning, Megan and I went down to breakfast and knew we had to meet the bus at 10. However, 10 normally means around 10:15 Spanish time. So we went back up to our room to get our stuff after breakfast and headed back down to the lobby to meet up with everyone for our trip to the Monastario do Sao Geronimo and Torre de Belem. We got downstairs and to our surprise, for the first time probably in the history of ISA, the bus left on time!!!! We had no idea what to do. After a little bit of panicking, we pulled out our itinerary for the trip and looked for what our first stop of the day was. It was the Monastery. We didn't know how good our chances of actually finding the group were, but we figured it was worth a shot to at least get a cab to take us there. As we pulled up to the Monastery, we were confronted with a big problem—the size of the building! We didn't even know where to start! We headed towards the main entrance, and boy was it our lucky day. Our group had barely been there for five minutes and had barely made it inside! We couldn't believe we actually found them! Once we were done explaining to our friends what had happened to us, we were able to enjoy our visit to the monastery. It had beautiful architecture, and even though it was raining, the courtyard was still gorgeous. The only way to do it justice is with pictures! Luckily I took quite a few.

Our next stop of the day was Torre de Belem. It's located right on the Rio Tajo, and was used to create a barrier to block ships coming in from the Atlantic. When I stepped off the bus I was immediately greeted with the smell of the ocean. As a true New Englander I have really missed it and stood for several minutes just looking at the water. I can't wait until it gets warmed and we can go to the beach! Our visit to the tower was pretty brief, and we were off on our panoramic tour of Lisbon. It really is such a beautiful city and I would love to go back once it gets nicer out! At the end of our tour we were dropped off at Plaza Rossio and set free to get some lunch and enjoy the rest of the afternoon and evening. My friends and I found a great little restaurant and had some more fantastic Portuguese food. I had chicken piri piri which was amazing. After lunch we roamed around the city some more and decided to make a second stop at our new favorite pastry shop. We got some hot chocolate and we each had different pastries so we could take bites of each others. We had been there the day before as well, and we got the same waiter. It's hard to tell whether he was happy to see us or not! After finishing our desserts, we all agreed we wish we could just transport that place to Sevilla!

For dinner we decided to go the cheap route. We knew there was a super market right next to the hotel, so we got some deli meats and cheese and some snacky stuff and basically had a picnic one of our hotel rooms! There were seven of us, so we each paid less than 5 euro for dinner, and there were enough leftovers for lunch the next day! We're still pretty proud of our frugality. Definitely planning on doing it again in Paris to save some major money!

I took a ton of pictures, and they're probably going to do a great job of filling in any holes I've left in our trip! Lisbon was really a neat city, and nothing like anywhere I've ever been. Next weekend my friends and I are taking on Paris so if anyone has any suggestions of special things to see or do (or places to eat) let me know!

Adios y besitos!